Round table held

Ministry of Justice held a roundtable session for «Discussion of comments and recommendations of the European Commission «For Democracy through Law «(Venice Commission) and OSCE / ODIHR concerning the codification of Ukrainian election law», as stated in the official notification.

«Venice Commission is ready to work hard and continue to improve Ukrainian electoral law», said a member of the European Commission «For Democracy through Law» (Venice Commission) Peter Pakzolay, noting that the development of any legislation should be guided by international standards taking into account national peculiarities.

«Our recommendations focus more on harmonization of election law rather than its codification. This will give us the big picture when people know their rights during the elections», said Don Bisson, legal expert with OSCE/ODIHR.

During the discussions participants of the «round table» pointed out that in the long run codification of election law will allow to avoid overregulation in the application of legal practices.

According to the president of the Institute of suffrage Iurii Kliuchkovsky, without proper unification of election law such a phenomenon as «electoral folklore» arises, and for Ukraine it is important to state its willingness to move in a civilized direction for updating the electoral law.

Round table involved prominent international experts of the Venice Commission and OSCE/ODIHR, EU Delegation to Ukraine, Council of Europe Office in Ukraine and other international missions and organizations, as well as people's deputies of Ukraine, representatives of national NGOs, renowned experts in the field of election law scholars (in total over 80 participants), and the media.